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- [00:00]
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- [01:49]
Don Wildman
The 1970s weren't all bad news. At least there was usually something decent on TV. And on April 17, 1976, surprised late night viewers tuned into NBC and saw President Gerald Ford standing in the Oval Office in front of the flag, staring, gun barrel straight into the camera, wearing a somewhat glazed expression as he announced live from New York, it's Saturday night. Cut to NBC Studio 8H, where a young Chevy Chase, the breakout star of SNL, launched into his impersonation of President Ford as a klutz who, if he wasn't falling over or fumbling a glass of water onto himself, was just about to Real life president meets exaggerated parody. The Commander in Chief deciding if you can't beat a joke, then join it. Well, for one line at least. Hello listeners, Great to have you with us. I'm Don Wildman and this is American History Hit. Today we progress onward with our President series as we now reach number 38, President Gerald R. Ford of Grand Rapids, Michigan. R is for Rudolph, Something central to understanding the boy who became the man More on that later. Ford's abbreviated presidency lasted from 1974 to 1977. During these years, Bruce Springsteen's Born to Run was released. Remember that well, because I'm from New Jersey. Blockbuster movies, the Godfather, Part two, Jaws, One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest. It was America's 200th birthday, the bicentennial in 1976. Unfortunately, concurrent with a stagnant economy and generally diminished morale thanks to Vietnam and a public hangover from Nixon and Watergate. All this was the backdrop for the Ford presidency. Ford was a moderate Republican, a respected, long serving member of the House of representatives for 12 terms, 24 years. Ford is most famously, of course, known as the man who replaced Nixon's vice president, Spiro T. Agnew, and then the President himself after Nixon resigned. Thus, Ford becomes the only US President to serve unelected by the American people. He is an enigmatic figure in the presidential pantheon for reasons we'll decipher today with Professor Katherine Brownell of Purdue University, who is the director of the center for American Political History and Technology, author of the book 24:7, cable television and the Fragmenting of America. From Watergate to Fox News. Professor Brownell was the guest for our Watergate episode number 139. Invite you to listen to that and greetings, Katie. Welcome back to American history hit.
- [04:36]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Thanks so much for having me. I'm thrilled to be back.
- [04:39]
Don Wildman
There is a fascinating biographical fact from Gerald Ford's earliest youth that I alluded to in the opening. And I just want to state it up front because I think it's. It strikes a chord, a theme that is resonant throughout his entire life. Ford was born Leslie Lynch King, Jr. In Omaha, Nebraska, July 14, 1913. But his parents separated weeks later and then divorced. His mom and him moved back to Grand Rapids. And very soon afterwards in her life, his mom meets a guy named Gerald R. Ford, who is a very respectable guy with a wonderful painting business. And he gives that name to his newly or soon to be adopted son, Gerald R. Ford. And that's. That's how Ford becomes his name. It's a fascinating thing, and I think it's important only to understand at the outset that Gerald Ford always played a role in accommodating disruption. That's my point. And it's a. And when that is imprinted early on in life, it sticks with you.
- [05:38]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Absolutely. And that's something that you could see throughout his congressional career. He was really respected as someone that everyone liked. Didn't cause a lot of controversy, didn't cause A lot of waves. And indeed, when Nixon had to find an appointment, a replacement for Spiro Agnew after he resigned, you know, the Watergate investigation had been heating up, and speaker of the House Carl Albert urged Nixon to pick someone that everyone liked. That was really what he urged. And he said, the person I encourage you to do, the one that everyone likes, is Gerald Ford.
- [06:15]
Don Wildman
Right. We'll get to all that in detail. But it's important to understand. I mentioned he is an enigma. People sort of never quite understood who he was because he was always kind of in the background of American politics. But that's kind of where it comes from, the psychology. He had three stepbrothers as a result of that remarriage. He attended University of Michigan and was a star athlete, big time. Wolverine's MVP two years in a row, 1934 and 35. And this becomes important to me. I don't know why, but because later on he is incorrectly identified as a klutz, when in fact, this man was an astonishing footballer who almost went pro with the Green Bay packers and the Detroit Lions. They were vying for him. He went the path of law. Instead. He passes the bar in Michigan after he studied law at Yale, then joins the Navy in World War II, sees a lot of action in the South Pacific on an aircraft carrier called the USS Monterey. I just think it's important to understand this guy had a heck of a life early on and was very celebrated, even at a New York City model for a girlfriend. I mean, it's so contrary to the reputation he has later on. He runs for Congress out of Grand Rapids, 1948. He beats the isolationist incumbent, Bartel Jonkman. Give me an idea of this time after World War II. What is the national politics in terms of the Republican Party?
- [07:39]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Yeah, so the 1948 elections, especially in Congress, are really significant. You've got a very divided Democratic Party. And so the Democrats are really dividing between their Southern wing. You have the Dixiecrats that kind of storm out of that convention. And so the Democratic Party is starting to come undone around some issues, especially around race. In the aftermath of the war. The Republican Party is not that much more unified. It also has these disparate wings. You have these more conservative pulses that are critiquing this notion that the United States should be an active global leader. And I think that that's something that really kind of comes out. Gerald Ford is on the other side. He's very much part of this more moderate Republican Party that is emerging that will coalesce around DWIGHT Eisenhower in 52 and really gained strength that the United States could and should be a world leader and should not risen from that global stage the way that many. This isolation impulse both in the Republican Party and there's some in the Democratic Party, but there is an isolationist, more conservative impulse in the Republican Party that loses out in 48 and then again in 52.
- [08:51]
Don Wildman
It's so interesting. I mean, I so value this series that we've done because it's given me perspective on the whole 20th century, really. But what happens after Truman, after World War II and his desegregation of the military, etc, right up until Brown vs Board of Education under Eisenhower. That whole period is really the engine of such discord, isn't it? It really splits both parties really. And it begins to set you up for Goldwater in 64 and then Nixon later on. And everything that kind of ripples through even to, to modern day starts at that period.
- [09:24]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Yeah, it really. It's the beginning of a partisan realignment where parties go from being more regionally and kind of finding common ground economically to really becoming more ideologically different. And in 1948 they were not ideologically different. In fact, there are a lot of ideological differences within parties, a lot of regional divides, a lot of class divides as well. And so you really do. It really is the beginning of the political realignment that you see bursting on the scene in the Republican Party in 64 and then very much on display in 1980.
- [10:01]
Don Wildman
Right. Nixon is going to drop drive this thing. And Ford had a very tight relationship with Nixon in the Congress. They were good pals. So it's that that really drives the interest and the Congress, as you say, Carl Albert, in choosing Ford as this replacement for Agnew. Can we talk about that, that episode and how it works?
- [10:20]
Professor Katherine Brownell
So Spiro Agnew was a favorite of the, the conservative wing of the Republican Party at this time. They were growing. They had been at the forefront of how Barry Goldwater was won the 64 nomination for the Republican Party. But if you recall, in 64, Goldwater gets smoked and it's a landslide election for Lyndon Johnson. But nevertheless, conservatives are starting to gain ground. They're very critical of the social welfare state that many moderate Republicans had bought into and had participated in building and expanding under Eisenhower and Johnson and Kennedy and even under Nixon in some capacities. And so there's this growing conservative wing and that doesn't necessarily trust Richard Nixon, but they become much more trustworthy. They fall into line more. So not completely. There are some that push for John Ashbrook to run in 72 to challenge Nixon, but they fall in line because they actually adore Spyro Agnew. Spyro Agnew is a vocal critic, especially of this liberal media bias and really was Nixon's attack dog against the liberalism and started to kind of turn this anti liberalism into more of a coherent conservative message. And so that's where Spiro Agnew really played a key role. And so his, when he ultimately had to resign because he was involved in these bribery scandals, this is a really key moment where conservatives are hoping that a conservative would be put in place. And of course that's not going to happen given the realities of the Watergate scandal as it's playing out at the time.
- [11:59]
Don Wildman
Yeah, there's a big controversy brewing, of course, as if it's important to recognize these are two separate scandals. Agnew's whole corruption scandal really dates back to being governor of Maryland and all that stuff that happened then. It's, it's later that Watergate really bubbles up and becomes what it is. But those are two separate things. It just feels like they're together because it's the same time period of 72 to 74. In light of those controversies, Nixon also picks Ford because he knows Congress is just going to approve him. Right. I mean that's, it's really important that this just happens quickly.
- [12:31]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Absolutely. He knows again, this is the fall of 73, after the summer, the televised hearings. I mean it's really. Watergate is starting to intensify. It's showing, it's starting to show some very, very concrete links between the higher ups of the Nixon White House and not just the burglary, but of course the COVID up. And so, you know, there's an intense political pressure and Nixon needs someone who is not controversial and again has this trust that a lot of people liked him and they trusted him and so that's really why he decides on Gerald Ford.
- [13:07]
Don Wildman
Right. But I want to score that this reputation that he has had has been developing for 20 years. You know, he's always been that guy in between and he's been a very respected member of that, of that inner circle of people. Lots of big committees that I think appropriations he was on or something, there are major committees he was the pro, he was the head of. Not to mention he's from a major Democratic state which is in Michigan, you know, big union territory, the auto workers and so forth. So he's really right in there in the strategy of that idea. He was frustrated, as I understand, because Nixon's landslide in 72 actually didn't give them the kind of majority that he was expecting would happen. Right. It's still so divided because the Congress is really Democratic.
- [13:52]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Absolutely. And, you know, Democrats had dominated Congress for quite some time at this moment. And this is something that in 72, if you look at the presidential map, all of the country except for Massachusetts and Washington, D.C. go for Richard Nixon, and that looks like a landslide. But the reality is that the Democratic Party was deeply divided on the presidential level. They had over a dozen people that ran in an open primary system. It was a very new nominating system that year. And so the presidential process was very contested, fragmented and divided. However, at the state and at the national level, in Congress, they still have a stronghold.
- [14:31]
Don Wildman
You know, what's interesting is that this is done under the 25th amendment. Of course, the Articles of the Constitution have originally ideas of the Vice President stepping in, but they really changed the Constitution or sharpened it, I guess, with the 25th Amendment. In light of the Kennedy assassination, 1967, this happened.
- [14:48]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Yeah. And that's what's really interesting is because in the wake of the Kennedy assassination, there's a lot of attention to this question of succession and who has authority. But again, it hadn't actually been implemented until this. So it's the first time. So it's making constitutional history because it's the first time that they're following this new procedure which ultimately says that when there's a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a vice President that will have to then be confirmed by the majority of both houses of Congress.
- [15:19]
Don Wildman
Right. This has not been attended to before. And this sets him up, as I said in the opening, to become the only unelected president in our entire history. It's so fascinating. From the moment Ford is inaugurated as Vice President, December 6, 1973, hardly approved by his congressional colleagues. As we said, Watergate then continues to unfold over the next year. Nixon won't resign until August 1974. So that's 10 months after he's been named to vice president. We're going to run into the moment that Nixon gives up the office. He is called secretly on August 1, 1974, by Alexander Haig, who was Nixon's chief of staff, who tells him to prepare. How does Ford go about this? Give me the whole experience that he's going through at this point.
- [16:09]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Well, again, I think it's important to remember that there was a sign that this was coming. There was a feeling that things were moving and that Impeachment was very, very real. And that is the only reason that Nixon was willing to resign, because he understood that after, in May, the House Judiciary Committee began debating articles of impeachment. And then, of course, there is this legal debate over the tapes. And does Nixon have privilege over them? Are they his property? The Supreme Court weighs in on the tapes in July, and then it becomes very clear that this is going to be the hard evidence. And then people in Senate, notably Barry Goldwater, one ofagain, the leader of this conservative wing, that the Republican Party, who had gotten behind Nixon, who, as he was embattled, felt that they found common ground. They argued that it's this liberal media that's out to get Nixon. And so they found this common ground. And then Barry Goldwater, when the evidence of the tapes comes out, he feels that Nixon had lied to them. He felt very betrayed, as did many people across the ideological spectrum in the Republican Party. And so he walks very famously down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Oval Office and tells Nixon that he has lost the support of his most ardent supporters. And so then it becomes very clear that there's going to be this transition and that he's either going to be impeached or he needs to resign. What's really interesting is, you know, of course, Gerald Ford gets this phone call. But one of the really interesting people that I studied in my recent book on cable television is this person called Clay Whitehead. And he was actually part of this team that was assembled of former Nixon advisors, of people that were really trusted, not because they were outside of the inner circles of this Watergate. And they started preparing for this transition. So they're starting to think, what will a transition look like? And, you know, this is happening throughout the summer of 74. So there's an entire team. So it's not just Gerald Ford that's thinking through it. There's an entire team of people that, you know, were not embroiled in the Watergate scandal, that were known for bringing, you know, this. This public service, this commitment to public service, not this partisan politics, this corrupt politics from the Nixon administration that then were helping Gerald Ford prepare.
- [18:32]
Don Wildman
They were demonstrating that they were serving the Constitution. A number one that was the top of the list. And I find myself sort of smiling, you know, remembering this time. It wasn't smiling at all. I mean, this was hardcore grim events going on. That was real brinkmanship as far as our national politics go and territory no one had been into before. This was really scary stuff for my parents. I was all of 10 years old at the time, but it was really hardcore stuff. Interesting sidelight Gerald Ford and Betty Ford were meant to be the first VP couple to live in the new vice presidential residence, which had been getting made and renovated on the naval base there up until this point where people live now. But they were not going to live there, it turned out, because it was a week later or something that they were told that this is going to happen. So August 7, 1974 Richard Nixon announces famous speech. Watch it on YouTube. Incredible moments. Effective noon tomorrow, he'll step down how did Ford feel about Nixon resigning? Did he? Had he supported his president in standing up to this? Or was he one of those who was advising him otherwise?
- [19:45]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Ford was not involved in these final decisions that Richard Nixon is making. Indeed, many people who suspected that some deal was struck about a pardon that would come later would fabricate this idea that there was this internal conspiracy. But in fact, the historical records don't show that at all. In fact, Gerald Ford understood that this was likely going to play and that he was going to step in into this unprecedented role. And he focused his time not on influencing Nixon, but on preparing for this very heavy weight of responsibility that he was going to have to bear by taking up the presidency after something that was truly unprecedented after a two year constitutional crisis. And that he was going to be the one, the unlikely leader to push people to help them grapple with the tragedy, the trauma that they had endured. And so that was his focus, more on the responsibilities that he knew he was going to assume at this unprecedented.
- [21:00]
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- [21:30]
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- [22:01]
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- [22:42]
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- [23:26]
Don Wildman
So let's state this outright. Ford has nothing to do with Watergate, but he's. He's going to find it hard to escape its shadow. That's the problem. Simply because it was hard to believe that there wasn't some kind of deal behind the scenes that this, this healer of the nation would also be, you know, a partner of, of a crook. On August 8, 1974, he is inaugurated and he announces, our long national nightmare is over. Many of us rolled our eyes. No, it's not. It just started. But thank you, Gerald Ford. He has done what he came to do. He's bridging us back to normalcy. That's how he sort of saw himself.
- [24:06]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Yeah, and in that same address, he talked about the importance of truth and straight talk. Those are the two terms that he used. And he really pledged that he would be honest to the American people after all of the deception and dishonesty that had been uncovered during the previous two years.
- [24:25]
Don Wildman
But he's dealing with disillusionment. He's dealing with hostility. The political and, and, well, the media environment is just a completely new, you know, can of worms. After, after the Washington Post is breaking all this stuff and it just gets kind of worse and worse. He, he's the guy who's really sort of standing there going, whoa, whoa, whoa. This all used to work because we kind of got together, you know, over at the Congress, but now the executive branch has just become the star of the show like never. Well, not, not like never before. It used to be under fdr, it's re emerged as a huge focus of Washington politics that hadn't been in my lifetime at the time. It was really a brand new game.
- [25:04]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Yeah. By the 1970s, when Ford steps into the office of the presidency in 74, the president is the star in a way that even surpasses what Franklin Roosevelt did because of television. Right. So it's not just the voice of the President that people are hearing. They're seeing, seeing him on this televised bully pulpit that Ford had actually pushed against in Congress for more opportunities for Congress to have access to television because he and many others in Congress felt that TV had given the Presidency too much power. Too much power to set the presidential agenda. Too much power in the public imagination at the expense of Congress. So Ford had been pushing in the 1960s for using the equal time clause of the FCC in a way that would allow members of Congress like himself to be on television more. So he understood what this had done in terms of shifting the attention to the presidency. What he didn't understand were all of the behind the scenes mechanisms that went into the production of the President as a television star. And this is what he struggled with, is that he had very small press operations as a representative from Michigan. Very, very tiny. And they served many different roles. They weren't just focused on communications. When you go into the White House, you have an entire team of people that are constantly thinking about your image and your message and the staging and the presentation and like that is a constant focus of the presidency by the 1970s, but it's not when he was representative. So it's really a significant transition in terms of communications expectations.
- [26:48]
Don Wildman
Just wait till the US Supreme Court lets the cameras in because that's, they're bound to do it because that's exactly what happens. All this press and all this attention has tilted these, these branches against each other in ways the Constitution could never have predicted. Of course, one month after he takes office, September 8, 1974, he makes the fateful decision, or at least the announcement of the decision. He grants Nixon, quote, full free and absolute pardon for all offenses. He is motivated to do so, he says, trying to move on from Watergate. Boy, does that backfire.
- [27:23]
Professor Katherine Brownell
It does. And that's where again, remembering that people had watched these behind the scenes conspiracies actually play out over the previous two years. They had seen all of these internal efforts to undermine opponents and create political discord. Not just with the break in and the COVID up of Watergate, but remember the Watergate investigation Exposed a range of different unethical and corrupt and dirty tricks that the Nixon administration was pursuing on a regular basis. So the assumption immediately is that, of course, this is the next chapter, that Gerald Ford was nominated Vice President because he made this agreement with Nixon, or that somehow along the way they had this negotiation where they had this agreement that, okay, Ford would step in, Nixon would step down, as long as he got that pardon. And so there are many different theories that start to circulate, but historians have not found any evidence that that actually happened, that there was any kind of discussion or an arrangement or even an understanding between Ford and Nixon about pardon. All of the documentary evidence really points to this notion that Ford believed it was in the best interest of the country to move forward, not go into another trial, a criminal trial that he thought that would have people relive the wounds of Watergate and really set a precedent that could be destructive down the road as well.
- [28:54]
Don Wildman
Yeah, he's handed a poison chalice, really. I mean, his major problem becomes this image problem that is in this media environment that's new to him and to us. Extremely hostile post Nixon. I mean, really, Nixon kind of released the hounds as far as the press is concerned. How is it that Ford can't manage that? Well, is he just bad at that or has he chosen to close off? What's his strategy that fails so badly? Because all I remember is Chevy Chase, you know, fumbling with a, you know, rolling a joint on snl.
- [29:28]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Absolutely. And that takes root because again, it's this particular moment where people are so cynical and the press is very cynical. But it's also at this moment when all of his advisors and all of the expectations for presidents are that they present a polished image. Right? So there's this constant, and these are the two legacies of Richard Nixon that he has to grapple with, is that the operations of politics more broadly, but specifically the White House, have become a well crafted machine focusing on cultivating a very specific presidential image that is then sold and packaged and sold to the American people and to journalists. Then, on the other hand, the legacy of Nixon is that this is all a fabrication. And it could be hiding not just gaffes, but those gaffes could be insight into a bigger corruption or bigger scandal that might be hidden behind the scenes. And so he's this pressure to have a polished communication effort as well, and more attention, Right. The cameras are on him. He's pursuing this Rose Garden strategy to try to bring restore faith and prestige and integrity to the President. But he does that via the media, right? So he has to have this apparatus while at the same time people are concerned that that apparatus is the problem. It's part of the problem of corruption and hiding Mr. Deeds as well.
- [30:53]
Don Wildman
But then you have the. The dog, the. The tail wagging the dog problem of media becoming its own big mess. You've written about this in your book I'll. I'll plug you 24. 7 cable. It's an important book because that is really such a huge theme in our society even today. I should point out, I mentioned Chevy Chase. This is the Saturday Night Live for audiences elsewhere who might not understand this. At the same time as Gerald Ford comes along, this amazing show that's on today 50 years later is Saturday Night Live. And the star of that show is Chevy Chase. And Ford was the, you know, just crosshairs for these guys because he was this nice guy president who was trying to do everything right but doing everything wrong at the same time. Somehow a perfect foil, a perfect, you know, target for mockery. And they, you know, make hay with him and do all sorts of things. He was, you know, this is what I mentioned in the beginning. He was characterized as this klutzy guy who was just sort of falling up and down stairs all the time and doing everything wrong. He was none of those things. He was a very poised individual, but it was the times. And so he was really getting the fray from what Nixon started. Tell me how they portray him. What does he look like on that show?
- [32:03]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Absolutely. So It's November of 1975, and Chevy Chase is debuting his new impersonation of Gerald Ford. And if you watch it, he doesn't dress like him. He doesn't try to impersonate the sound of his voice or any of his mannerisms. All he does is knock things over, and he's klutzy. And that's how. And you have this unpresidential seal that's on a podium, but that's really all that they're doing. But this was really new in terms of directly tackling saying, I'm Chevy Chase, right? And that's how he. Or, sorry, I'm Gerald Ford. So this starts in November, and it made Ron Nessen Gerald Ford's press secretary. It just made him cringe. But then he thought, like, is there a way we can use this? And so that March, he and the President decided that they're going to invite Chevy Chase to perform at the White House Correspondents Dinner. And the President actually tries to turn the tables and says, I'm Gerald Ford and you're not right. And so he sees this as a way to kind of tap in and try to reverse the narrative. It's this battle of co optation. Al Franken saw Ron Nessen when they were in the New Hampshire primary and he said, you know, we should have you on the show. And Ron Nesson considered the offer. And ultimately, after the success of that March dinner when Gerald Ford was in person, you know, kind of turned the tables on Chevy Chase. He decided that he would guest host the show. And so Ron Nesson guest hosted the show in April. The opening, you know, that live from Saturday night was something that was pre filmed from the White House. But Gerald Ford does make an appearance. And you know, Ron Nesson is really interesting throughout that performance, which kind of gets to these dynamics that we've been talking about, about that, that search for more transparency and authenticity, but also this escalation of image construction because so Ron Nesson plays the press secretary talking about, you know, how, how Gerald Ford should deal with this bumbling image. So it's this inside look to the Oval Office and they make fun of all of the press secretary, not always telling the truth and spinning the truth. Right. And so that's actually a theme of the broader episode.
- [34:16]
Don Wildman
They get a lot of attention and it becomes exactly what Saturday Night Live does for the next 50 years to a lot of presidents.
- [34:23]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Exactly.
- [34:24]
Don Wildman
This is the story with General Ford. We haven't even talked about him being president. We just talk about him getting to be president. What he does immediately, that's the problem with understanding this particular US President. Let's discuss this. So he, he does pretty good things as president. They don't get a lot of attention historically. But he, he, you know, sets the course for a recovery for the economy. He continues the detente for international relations to move towards what happens under Reagan. And you know, the, the handshakes with Gorbachev later on, all that begins kind of taking hold with Ford. Even the Israeli, Egyptian stuff that happens under Carter later on. Ford has a lot to do with all of that stuff.
- [35:04]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Yeah. One of the things that I've looked at in my work are, you know, he made regulatory reform a pillar of his presidency and he really wanted to pursue this, to kind of think about agencies that had too much bureaucratic oversight, too much red tape. How could they function more if efficiently and not just serve the corporate interests that had kind of gained regulatory control over them, or what's called regulatory capture. So he's really taking on some powerful lobbying industries in a way that he sees as really making regulations more responsive to citizens and consumers. And so he takes on. I watched him take on in the archives that I've done for my book on cable television. He took on the broadcast lobby, which was incredibly powerful, and really initiated the start of the decentralization of our media landscape that we have today. During his presidency, you had the big three, abc, CBS, and NBC, that dominated what people saw on their television screens and fought against any newcomers coming in. And he was willing initially, I should say he was willing to initially to kind of stand up to that and question these regulatory assumptions of power that had been in place for decades. However, I will say that 1975, you see him take a lot of action. By early 1976, he's focused all on reelection. By that spring, he's being challenged by Ronald Reagan in primaries. And all of a sudden, he kind of pulls back on some of those. Those more assertive measures because he's looking to kind of create political capital and political friends that can help him win reelection.
- [36:46]
Don Wildman
Well, this is the emergence of what you mentioned before, this hard right which becomes Ronald Reagan, really. And they start to undermine his centrist attitudes and policies at this time. And there's some real bad early debate stuff happening in New Hampshire between Reagan and Ford in that election. But the damage is done. But it's important to recognize that it comes from within his party as much as it comes from the outsider, Jimmy Carter, calling him out.
- [37:12]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Absolutely. So in 72, the Democratic Party for the first time implements these primaries and, you know, allows different voices to come in and kind of compete for the presidential nomination. And the Republican Party is moving towards that in 76 and, you know, is trying to make it a more open process. And Ronald Reagan capitalizes on it, especially, you know, he goes to New Hampshire, but also does very, very well in the south, where this more conservative wing of the Republican Party understood that their message of small government and states rights, that that would play very well in the south with those Southern Democrats that had left the party, the Democratic Party, over the issues of civil rights. And so Ronald Reagan is critiquing his legitimacy, his leadership abilities. And so, again, a lot of these attacks on Ford begin with Reagan. And then Jimmy Carter is able to, you know, capitalize on them because they're already out there. There are these narratives that have already emerged. And I think, you know, when we kind of talked about this broader media environment where the press is more cynical, where entertainment shows like Saturday Night Live are poking fun at him, Ronald Reagan and his Critique is tapping into that and then further escalating that as well.
- [38:32]
Don Wildman
Well, Carter's also running against Nixon. I mean, that's really. Nixon is still the, the Ford Nixon thing. And so it's easier for someone like Carter, who'd never served in federal office, he was the governor of Georgia, to sort of point the finger and say, you know, we gotta clean this place up. It's the old traditional thing to say, you know, I gotta come from outside the Beltway. And Carter plays that to the hilt. Fort does plays a role. He gaffes a bit. He's, you know, making mistakes in his debates and. But they have that first big debate that's on. It sort of harkens back to the Kennedy Nixon thing, doesn't it?
- [39:07]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Absolutely. There had not been a television debate since 1960. And part of that is because those debates loomed large in the mind of Richard Nixon. He firmly believed that he lost the election because of those debates. The reality is much more complicated. But in his mind, it was those debates that like that really that triggered his downfall there. LYNDON Johnson in 64 is not going to debate. He's the incumbent at that moment is running for election as president. And so he's certainly not going. There's no incentive for him to debate in 68. Richard Nixon sure is not going to do it, and he's not going to do it in 72. And so finally you have these debates that this question of will debates bring more transparency, more accountability by, you know, forcing the candidates to answer questions on TV directly to citizens? And there was a consensus that, yes, these are good things. It was about restoring accountability and again, more of this transparency to the political process.
- [40:10]
Don Wildman
And it was the League of Women Voters. Right. I mean, they were sponsoring the debates that sounded so good in the ERA days.
- [40:15]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Absolutely. And they're all about getting women to turn out, getting all of these different citizens engaged in the political process. And so, yes, absolutely, the League of Women Voters, they take charge, they sponsor these debates, and both parties agreed to them because they realized that in this broader environment where there's women, more scrutiny. This scrutiny was originally seen as essential to ensuring that there's no corruption or unethical behavior. Of course, this is part of this broader tension is that you have more media scrutiny, but also then more efforts to control images. And so both sides are polling responses and polling issues. So it's actually less authentic, but it was deemed as part of restoring authenticity to politics. And so it's this mass mediated tension that really comes out of these debates. And it's part of this broader landscape that Ford and Carter are both navigating.
- [41:23]
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- [42:41]
Don Wildman
So the classic bio question, what do you make of of Gerald Ford's legacy as a president? It's so short lived.
- [42:49]
Professor Katherine Brownell
I think that he really is this transition person, a person that attempted to restore faith and integrity in democratic institutions after they were really called into question. And he really does try to fulfill that role. He says that, look, this is an example that the system works and he tried to show that it, tried to restore faith in the presidency and restore integrity in the presidency. But he's also in this transition role where media and cynicism and entertainment become more of a factor in how people are consuming politics. And so you mentioned Saturday Night Live earlier, but I think that's actually really significant, especially when we look at our current political landscape, is that he saw this criticism and Chevy Chase's performance gained resonance with the American public because it tapped into this broader narrative of this accidental president. And then he actually made him accidental and clumsy. Right? But Gerald Ford didn't push back against that. He didn't try to censor that. He tried to embrace it and say, okay, like I'm going to try to humanize the presidency. He wanted to show that he had a sense of humor. But what he does in that is that he then kind of gives by having his press secretary go on to host Saturday Night Live, by appearing as the open doing the opening a clip from the Oval Office live from New York, he's actually legitimizing the role of elevating the role of entertainment in the political process. And so then that actually, you know, that paves the way for someone like Ronald Reagan and later on Donald Trump to kind of use their credentials in entertainment as justification for their political qualifications.
- [44:39]
Don Wildman
How interesting. How ironic that someone like Gerald Ford should be the one who, who, as I say, releases those hounds.
- [44:45]
Professor Katherine Brownell
He was very uncomfortable with this, I will say. His team was very, you know, they didn't know what to do because this was new terrain having, you know, a late night show impersonate a president. That was really new. And so they were trying to deal with this in a way that, you know, showed that he wasn't, you know, trying to control and manipulate images like Richard Nixon had. So again, this legacy of Nixon is looming over him.
- [45:13]
Don Wildman
Right. And we live in that landscape today. I mean, in both the entertainment and the news aspect of media. It is a whole different world than the one I was born into. Professor Katherine Brownell teaches history at Purdue University, where she's also the director of CAPT center for American Political History and Technology on the Purdue campus. She is author of, as we've mentioned Several times, a book 24 7, cable television and the Fragmenting of America From Watergate to Fox News. We're gonna have you back, Katie, to talk about that. And for anyone curious, please do have a listen to her expertise about Watergate. On the American History Hit Episode 139 I mentioned, go to American History Hit page and hit all episodes and nearly 300 will scroll fourth. But listen to hers first. Thank you very much, Katie. Really appreciate it. See you soon.
- [46:03]
Professor Katherine Brownell
Thanks so much for having me.
- [46:09]
Don Wildman
Thanks for listening to this episode of American History Hit. As you've made it this far, why not like and follow us wherever you get your podcasts? American History Hit A podcast from History hit.
- [46:27]
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Don Wildman
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